Water separator filter

[CIVANO]

May not be of interest to you guys but my gas/water separator filter is in a dark area near the bilge in the dark and I can not easily tell if there is water held in the clear reservoir. I found that some plastics sink in gas but float in water. I searched for different plastics around the shop and found tha a small piece of an old black discarded cutting board did just that. I am going to remove the bowl and add this little piece and will have a clear indicator of water in the bowl.

 

[sly_karma]

Or you could skip the clear bowl worry focus and just change a cartridge filter every season.

 

[RELIC]

Or you could skip the clear bowl worry focus and just change a cartridge filter every season.

Most of the time changing the cartridge every year is fine except if your are getting a lot of water in your tank as we had happen in my buddies boat off Bajo reef. We were in pretty rough seas and water was getting in his filler in the stern and we had to shut down in the **** to change the canister which soon filled up again with water. He now has the clear bowl so we can see the water and drain it off with the engine running before it gets to the engine.

 

[easydoesit]

Damn! That’s clever.

 

[Sharphooks]

Or you could skip the clear bowl worry focus and just change a cartridge filter every season.

Changing the filter once every season is fine if you have nice clean tanks with minimal water in the gas. A few weeks ago I checked out the glass bowls of my two water/fuel separators and saw nothing amiss…no clear separating of anything so I thought I was good.

A few minutes later I got a “water in fuel” message on my gauge and before I could react my starboard Suzuki shuddered and died.

I drained both bowls into a bucket and stuck my nose in the bucket—-pure water, zero gas.

I tell this story because the filter in the starboard fuel/water separator (the one connected to the Suzuki that broke down due to water ingestion) only had 20 hours of run-time on it….

I had my fuel polished and they pulled approx 60 liters of water out of both my tanks…..that amount of water quickly over-powers a 10 micron filter….lesson learned

 

[wolf]

I had my fuel polished and they pulled approx 60 liters of water out of both my tanks…..that amount of water quickly over-powers a 10 micron filter….lesson learned

I have to ask WHY so much water?? thats alot I think there is a bigger issue if there is 60 litres in your tank...IMO

I was also told once water hit these filters they are no good ?? I dont know, I change mine every year no matter what and look at my bowl weekly

 

[Flashman]

You can install a bowl with a port for a water sensor in any racor. No more guessing if it has water in it, or not noticing when it gets a big slug of water and fills up quickly. They work like a charm. I switched to a contaminated tank one day and had to stop every 5-15 minutes to drain water from the racor but never had a problem with water getting to the engine over the two hours before I was back at the dock. The sensor is just a set of probes that don't pass current until there's water to complete the circuit between them. It ties directly into mercury engine harnesses or you can wire it to a relay or really anything that takes a low current voltage signal.

Personally, I consider a water separating filter of very limited use without a sensor on it. Unless you get tiny amounts of water slowly into the filter and check it constantly the chances of overwhelming it and getting water in the engine are high. My experience has been a tank will accumulate a lot of water before the pickup pulls it in, and usually when it's rough and the water sloshes around. In that scenario there's almost guaranteed to be more water than the filter can hold and unless you check it multiple times an hour, you're getting water in your engine.

 

[Flashman]

May not be of interest to you guys but my gas/water separator filter is in a dark area near the bilge in the dark and I can not easily tell if there is water held in the clear reservoir. I found that some plastics sink in gas but float in water. I searched for different plastics around the shop and found tha a small piece of an old black discarded cutting board did just that. I am going to remove the bowl and add this little piece and will have a clear indicator of water in the bowl. View attachment 117086

That's a great idea. I like it. Thanks for sharing.